Tag Archives: Food

I must first start our little quick recap of Thanksgiving with a JibJab video Brett made of us (may take a few seconds to load).

We started the day with breakfast casserole and ended with a delicious meal with family. Trent was absolutely amazing…I am so proud of him…he sat in a booster seat, ate most of his plate of turkey, mashed potatoes and sweet potatoes and had fun playing with his cousins and the kitty of the house. It surely was a day to be thankful for and I hope your holiday was also spectacular.

Mmmm Brett’s sweet potatoes are always a hit. We had almost none leftover to bring home

My sweet little reluctant model.

The fried turkey was successfully cooked without burning down the house.

Kitties like turkey, too!

Time for dessert!

The rest of the weekend was spent putting up Christmas decorations - Brett did the entire outside of the house himself! It looks amazing and I will try to share some photos of everything next week or so. We’ll be in Walt Disney World this weekend, so we have some preparations to complete before then. It’s supposed to be in the 80′s there! Love it.

Psst…have you entered our current giveaway yet? Go here to enter now!

 

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This is a sponsored post written by me on behalf of PAM Cooking Spray.

One year, I made the mistake of not eating at all on Thanksgiving morning, hoping to save the most room for the delicious feast later that day. It totally had the opposite effect…I definitely could not eat as much. So now, given that it’s a nice family day at home before gathering with everyone later, Brett makes a tasty breakfast for us to enjoy…nothing too heavy and nothing too tedious.

This year, he made a breakfast casserole and it was so delicious. Given our itty bitty family of 3, we had leftovers the next few days too…perfect for a long holiday weekend of decorating the house in all it’s Christmas merriment.

I received 2 cans on Pam Cooking Spray, Original formula and Baking formula. Both formulas (and the Butter formula) now leave up to 99 percent less residue buildup than margarine or bargain-brand cooking sprays, while still offering superior no-stick results. There’s also zero calories…not that I count those on Thanksgiving, but I’ll take the savings wherever I can get them.

It was important to use a non-stick spray like Pam since we were using the Le Creuset Pie Dish we also received and didn’t want any of the cheesy casserole to stick to the pan and/or get burnt. Burnt cheese = no bueno.

Cheesy Breakfast Casserole

6-8 eggs (depending on size of baking dish/pan)

Large bag of shredded hash browns

Turkey breakfast sausage (you can also use regular sausage)

Bacon (we opted for the pre-cooked variety to save time)

Cheddar cheese

1/4 cup milk (not shown)

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Dice the bacon into little pieces.

2. In a bowl, whisk the eggs with the milk.

3. Spray the pie dish with Pam.

4. Brown the shredded hash browns according to the package.

5. Brown the ground sausage.

6. Add the bacon and hash browns to the sausage and mix together well.

7. Pour the mixture into the pie dish and cover with the eggs.

8. Bake for 30-40 minutes until eggs are firm.

9. Cover with cheddar cheese and melt in the oven.

10. Cut your piece and enjoy!

 

Each piece slid right out thanks to Pam. Clean-up was super easy, too. Often, the right preparations before a meal can make it much easier to clean up afterward and save more time for friends and family. Last Christmas, we tried making a red velvet cheese roll and that thing stuck to everything so much that we had to trash it and make another one. We don’t want to do that again, so we make sure we spray everything and follow any recipe advice that we find online…if you find a recipe online that has comments on it, make sure you scroll through them to see if anyone offers some words of wisdom. Brett has found some great modifications to recipes in the comments!

We also used this pie dish later on in the day for our sweet potato dish for Thanksgiving - yum!

How would you like to win your very own Pam Cooking Spray kit to help with your holiday cooking and baking? Check out the giveaway below!

 

***GIVEAWAY***

Up for grabs: A Pam Cooking Spray Kit valued at $50

• Full size sample of Pam
• Le Creuset Pie Dish

Eligibility: All entrants must be 18 years+ and reside in the continental US. (view the full terms & conditions here)

Contest Ends: Wednesday, December 11, 2025 at 11:59pm

How to enter: Simply leave a comment on this blog post with the answer to this question: “What is your favorite dish to make (or eat) during the holidays?”

One winner will be selected at random from the comments on this post and announced as an update to this post and on Facebook/Twitter. I will also contact the winner by email. See full giveaway terms & conditions here.

Good luck!!

 

This is a sponsored post written by me on behalf of PAM Cooking Spray.
For more information, visit http://www.pamcookingspray.com.

November was MY month, apparently. Well, I guess me and millions of others too, since it’s National Peanut Butter Lovers Month and I am definitely a peanut butter lover.

When I became a Hormel Extended Family Blogger, I was surprised to learn about all the other brands that are in the Hormel family of brands. Perhaps the brand I was most excited about and knew I would definitely be posting about at least once during my tenure was Skippy peanut butter. Imagine my delight when I received a jar of it this month from Hormel as part of my Hormel partnership!

And after visiting the Skippy website, I was even more surprised at the number of varieties of peanut butter they offer. Why oh why have I never heard of the Skippy Natural Peanut Butter Spread with Dark Chocolate?! Publix needs to carry that asap!

I was going to come up with a great recipe to share, but besides the fact that the jar was consumed entirely too fast (don’t judge me!), I figured I’d share the delicious recipes available on the Skippy website.

At our Thanksgiving meal dessert, we had a dessert dip with Nilla wafers, apples and chocolate wafers to dip with.

It was so tasty and can be an easy anytime treat. Here is a similar recipe from the Skippy website for Peanut Butter S’mores Dip.

As stated in the recipe, you can pair it with graham crackers, but you could also pair it with bananas, apples, or wafers. You can also form it into a ball and roll it in chocolate and peanut butter chips and place it on a serving platter to make a peanut butter “cheese ball” for gatherings!

 

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I am currently a member of the Hormel Foods Extended Blogger Program and this post is part of my involvement with the group.

Happy Thanksgiving friends! While I’m waiting for Brett to cook our Thanksgiving breakfast casserole (recipe & giveaway coming next week!), here’s the second Christmas Gift Guide in our series this year…for your food-loving friend or family member.

Just an FYI: I’m not affiliated with any of these companies (except for the giveaway below), I just picked these products because they seem pretty awesome! Some of these items contain affiliate links (mostly Amazon), which do not impact your purchase price/experience. If you are considering making a purchase from Amazon, please consider using one of these links first and thank you for supporting this little blog!

1. French Fry Dipping Cone: Fries and ketchup, hummus and carrots, any combo your heart desires. This is great for a little snack that you can carry around with you and it even fits in a cupholder. Hello snackage in the car!

2. KitchenAid Ice Cream Maker Attachment: Brett has a Kitchenaid mixer (if you don’t already have one, get on that asap! It’s the best thing ever for my cookie/cake/brownie/pancake/all-food-in-general loving self). This would be a fun somewhat-cheap attachment (compared to some other ones that are available) to make homemade ice cream. Even better if you have kids.

3. Guy Fieri Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives Book: Brett’s aunt and uncle went on a road-trip and brought one of Guy Fieri’s books with them and stopped at a couple of locations along the way. This sounds like fun if you are a fan of this show or want to try somewhere that has been “Seen on TV”!

4. Star Wars Glowing Lightsaber Popsicle Molds: Popsicle lightsaber molds that actually glow! Much better than those plain boring popsicle molds.

5. NatureBox Subscription: Or any other food subscription box. And trust me, there are plenty of options for all price ranges. This NatureBox subscription is $19.99 a month for 5-7 snack samples.

6. Bacon Bandages: Just ‘cuz.

7. The Dipr Ultimate Cookie Spoon: Perfect for any Oreo fan that just has to have it dipped and soaked in milk (like me!). At $2.99, this would be a fun stocking stuffer or pair with some packages of cookies and a mug set for fun gift package.

 

**Giveaway!**

Are you an Oreo fan or know a “dunker” that would love a Dipr?

Win a set of 5 Diprs - 1 in every color by using the Rafflecopter widget below - it’s the easiest entry ever! 2 winners will be chosen! US only please. Contest ends Sunday, December 1st at 11:59pm.

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Happy Halloween! Here’s one of our creations from the Halloween Party this past weekend…Zombie Flesh Cupcakes!

Brett usually comes up with some fun, creative Halloween-themed food items for his mom’s annual Halloween Party. He usually makes about 2-3 things. Sometimes I’ll make something…usually crockpot meatballs, which require almost no effort on my part lol, but the past few years it’s been all him.

This year, the item I was looking forward to the most were his cupcakes. He takes his cupcake duties pretty seriously and his are some of the best ever. Back when the menu items were discussed, he offered to make cupcakes, but hadn’t decided what exactly he would make.

When we were in WDW last week, one of my must-try items was the King Cupcake only available at the Pop Century resort, which I got on our way home from the World.

It’s a chocolate cupcake, filled with banana, topped with peanut butter frosting and candied bacon bits. It was so delicious, it inspired Brett to make something similar for the Halloween Party!

Zombie Flesh Cupcakes!!

He thought they would be better without the banana filling and I didn’t care either way as long as he kept the other three ingredients. Here are the steps!

 

Chocolate Cake:

This one is easy. Just prepare your favorite chocolate cake…boxed mix, from scratch, already made from the store…we don’t judge We used Halloween cupcake liners like these ones.

 

Peanut Butter Frosting:

Brett used this recipe for peanut butter buttercream frosting and tripled it to make enough for 32 cupcakes. Once ready, he put it in a piping bag and swirled it on top of the cupcakes.

 

Candied Bacon:

Mix together in a bowl: 1 cup of brown sugar and 1 tbs of cinnamon, then coat each piece of bacon, then place bacon on a rack on a cookie sheet and bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes.

We used Hormel Black Label Maple Flavored bacon to have thick pieces of maple bacon perfect for candied bacon.

Cut up several pieces of bacon into tiny pieces and then cut the rest into pieces a few inches long. Place 1 larger piece on each cupcake and then sprinkle the rest of the bits on top of the cupcakes.

Enjoy!

I think these aren’t just for Halloween and should be made for my birthday too (wink, wink Brett!).

 

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I am currently a member of the Hormel Foods Extended Blogger Program and this post is part of my involvement with the group, however I purchased this bacon on my own and totally ate like 6 of these cupcakes myself.